


Ah! Coffee, Thank You!

by madsydva



Series: Sherlockian Things Prompt Challenge [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, First Meetings, M/M, Rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 03:47:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12225126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madsydva/pseuds/madsydva
Summary: Alternate Meeting for John and Sherlock.





	Ah! Coffee, Thank You!

**Author's Note:**

> This is a writing prompt for week 1 in the Sherlockian Things Facebook Group. The challenge was to re-write Sherlock and John's first meeting. I kept some of the same dialogue with a little John/Molly flirting that I was not expecting when I started the story. They got away from me and started it on their own I swear! This is my first Sherlock story and my first published work on AO3! Let me know what you think! Thanks!
> 
> I do not own these characters! They belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Gatiss, Stephen Moffatt, Hartswood Films and the BBC!

"Thank you so much for your time and this opportunity." John Watson said standing from his chair.

"You're most welcome. Expect to hear from us very soon, Dr Watson." The A&E director of Bart's Hospital said, reaching out to shake John's hand. 

John exited the director's office feeling quite pleased with himself. This would be blog worthy. Ella, his therapist, had insisted he start a blog to write about his post-military service life to help him cope with his PTSD. He had insisted that nothing EVER happened to him that was interesting enough to write about. 

It was just his luck, right after his last session with Ella, when she expressed her disappointment with him not making any progress with his blog, that he ran into his old mate Mike Stamford in the park on his way home. Mike had told him about an opening in the A&E at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. He and Mike had done their residency there together after Medical School. John had mentioned that he was in the market for a new position, since having returned from Afghanistan and Mike had offered to put in a word for him to get an interview. 

John had finished his residency and graduated in the spring of 2001. He took the summer off and spent some time with his mother and his sister, Harry. He was back in London, job searching on the afternoon of September 11th, 2001, when the whole world seemed to have gone to hell. A few weeks later when the Queen and Prime Minister announced that the UK would aide the US in the invasion of Afghanistan, John made the decision to serve his country and the world as a Field Medic in the British Army. After almost 9 years of field service, John was shot by a sniper while trying to save the commander of the corp he was serving with. That's how he had ended up back here at Bart's once again.

John strolled down the hall and into the main lobby of the hospital, taking note of all the improvements to the hospital since the last time he was here. He was gazing at a large mural over the main doors that depicted a timeline of doctors and medicine in England. The beginning of the timeline showed a particularly graphic scene of a "doctor" performing a bloodletting during the dark ages. It appeared that the patient even had leeches on her face. John shook his head. Medicine has come a long way since then. He thought.

John started moving for the door before looking where he was going and immediately slammed into a young woman carrying two cups of coffee. The coffees exploded and showered them both. 

"Oh bugger!" John exclaimed. Luckily the coffee wasn't very hot and John was wearing too many layers for it to soak through.

"Oh my goodness! I am SO sorry!" The young woman stammered. 

"No, No. It's my fault. I was distracted by the bloodletting." John joked.

"What?"

"Oh... um. The mural?" John says pointing above the door.

"Right. Well, I better go get cleaned up." She said leaning down to pick up the coffee cups off the floor.

"Here let me." John bends down and picks up the cups. " Can I buy you... and your friend.... new cups of coffee?" He said gesturing with the cups. 

"Um... sure." the young woman said with a smile. "The loo is right over here if you want to get cleaned up." She entered the woman's and he ducked into the men's. He tossed the empty coffee cups into the bin and walked over to the sink. He tried, with little result, to soak the coffee out of his good shirt but his coat seemed no worse for the wear. John exited the bathroom and stood, leaning on his cane, waiting for the young woman to come out of the bathroom. 

When she did come out, she smiled at him.

"Shall we get those coffees?" He asked. She nodded and they started to walk to the cafe that was in the lobby.

"My name's John, by the way. John Watson."  
"Oh! Yes! Molly Hooper." The young woman answered waving her fingers.

John smiled. "Are you a doctor here, Molly Hooper?" He asked looking at her white lab coat.

"Oh no! I'm a pathologist... in the morgue." She answers as they approach the cafe counter. 

"Go ahead and order what needs replacing." John says shooing her forward.

Molly orders one coffee, black, two sugars and a French vanilla cappuccino. John steps up and orders a black coffee and pays for all three.

"Um, so what brings you to the hospital today, Mr. Watson?" Molly asks while they wait for their coffees.

"Oh, John, please. And it's Doctor actually. I had an interview today for the opening in the A&E department." He says rubbing the back of his neck.

"Oh! That's good.. I mean nice..." Molly stammers.

Their coffees come up and they collect them.

"Can I walk you to your... uh.... morgue?" John asks.

"Actually I'm meeting... my friend in the lab." She says holding up the black coffee with two sugars. 

"I'll walk with you." John says.

"Um, okay." Molly mutters. They walk to the lift and Molly pushes the down button. 

"So what did you do? I mean for work. Where were you working before?" Molly asks.

"Army doctor. I was a Captain with the 5th Northumberland Fusiliers. I've been in Afghanistan. Then I was shot and they sent me home." John explained as they stepped onto the lift.

"Oh! I'm sorry!" Molly said pushing the 'LL' button as the doors closed.

"Oh it's nothing. But I will miss the work. I was working as a field medic when I was shot. I guess I liked being in the thick of it rather than in the field hospital."

The doors opened and they walked down the hall toward a wooden door. Molly seemed to stop short and take a deep breath before leading them both through the door.

"Ah, Molly! Coffee, thank you!"

Molly walked over and delivered the black, two sugars coffee to a tall, thin man in a suit. He was using a pipette to add something to a Petri dish. The man looked up at her with a question on his face and Molly's face seemed to go ghost white, as if she'd been caught.

"What happened to the lipstick?" He asked. 

"It wasn't working for me." Molly said quietly.

"Really? I thought it was a big improvement. Your mouth's too small now." He said taking a sip of his coffee and going back to his experiment.

"Okay." Molly squeaked and turned back to John, and was just about to suggest that they take their coffee to her office when...

"Molly, can I borrow your phone? There's no signal on mine." The tall man says.

"Sherlock, you know I keep mine locked up in my office. Besides what's wrong with the landline?"

"You know I prefer to text." Sherlock says with a huff.

"Sorry." Molly mumbles.

"Uh, here, use mine." John says digging in his pocket and holding out his phone.

"Oh, Thank you." Sherlock crosses the room and takes the phone from John. 

"This is John. He interviewed for the open position in A&E. Maybe you two will be seeing more of each other. Sherlock's always turning up in A&E." Molly explains with a laugh. 

Sherlock ignores Molly, but quickly eyes John and asks "Afghanistan or Iraq?"

"Sherlock, don't." Molly warns from the other side of the lab table.

"Sorry?" John questions with a glance at Molly.

"Which was it? Afghanistan or Iraq?" Sherlock repeats, hitting send on the text and handing the phone back to John. Molly sighs and looks away.

"Afghanistan." John says with disbelief. "Sorry, how did you know..." John's phone rang loudly in his pocket, interrupting him. He checks the caller ID and it reads 'St. Bart's Hospital'. "Excuse me. I have to take this." John says to Molly and steps out into the hallway to answer the phone.

Molly turns to Sherlock. "Sherlock, he's new to town, finding his footing. Don't run him off."

"Molly, romantic entanglement with that man would not be in your best interest. It's clear he's just returned from the war with an injury. He has PTSD and would keep you up all night with nightmares, even if he doesn't have any issues performing before hand. And it's also clear that his limp is psychosomatic. You can't fix him." He says without even looking at her. Mollys mouth forms a tight line.

John re-enters the lab. "That was the director of A&E. They've offered me the position! They want me to start on Wednesday."

"That's great!" Molly exclaims. "We should have lunch on Wednesday, on your first day." She glances at Sherlock, daring him.

"Yes! That would be nice." John says. "You could join us, too, Sherlock." He adds.

"Sorry. Busy." Sherlock says without looking up from his microscope.

"Right.... Well, I best be off. I've found a job, now I need to find a place to live. I'm looking for a flat share." 

Sherlock freezes in his work and looks as if he's about to say something, but changes his mind.

"I'll walk you to the lift." Molly says. John glances at Sherlock, engrossed in his microscope before following Molly out the door. Once the door closes, Molly says, "Sorry about him, he can be a little... straight forward sometimes."

"Is that what you call it?"

"He just sees things that we don't see. He could tell you things about yourself that no one else could possibly know. He's very good at what he does."

"And what exactly does he do?" John asks pushing the up button for the lift.

"He consults with the Yard. Helps them solve cases that they can't figure out."

"I see." John says as the lift arrives and the doors ding open. "Well, it was nice meeting you, Miss Hooper." He says holding out his hand. Molly shakes it.

"Good to meet you, too, Dr. Watson."

"Right well, see you on Wednesday." John says stepping on to the lift.

"Yes. Wednesday." Molly says as the doors slowly close.


End file.
